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Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph (10-15-02)

Radioactive soil from New Jersey won't be taken to Cañon City anytime soon based on a state agency's rejection Tuesday of the Cotter Corp's application to use its mill as a nuclear waste dump.

The Colorado Department of Health and Environment said it had concerns about transportation safety and the socioeconomic impacts the nuclear waste shipments may have on Canon City. The Cotter Corp. can resubmit its application if it addresses those issues.

But the tone of the state's rejection shows the company faces an uphill battle, and Cañon City residents who mobilized against the disposal plan in February were celebrating what they saw as a big victory Tuesday.

"After eight months of this I don't consider anything a slam-dunk victory, but I think this is fantastic news," said Sharyn Cunningham, co-chair of Colorado Citizens Against Toxic Waste.

The citizens group formed after a Gazette story in February revealed Cotter's plan to bury up to 470,000 tons of radioactive soil from a Superfund site in Maywood, N.J., about 12 miles west of New York City. Cotter figured to get a big share of a $70 million transportation-and-disposal contract from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The Cotter mill, historically a uranium-processing operation, has been the target of a series of successful lawsuits filed by nearby residents who claimed radioactivity from the mill caused death and birth defects during the past 30 years.

"I think this story is about a company that wanted to change its business to a radioactive waste disposal business," Cunningham said. "If Cotter could do this then other businesses elsewhere in the state could do it."

Acting Director Douglas Benevento said Cunningham and her colleagues "were right in one way: What they've attempted to do is take contaminated soil from New Jersey and take it for disposal."

When called Tuesday for a response, Cotter Vice President Rich Ziegler declined comment, saying it was the first he had heard of the health department's action.

In a letter to Cotter, the agency said the company's environmental assessment for the disposal operation was "not adequate." Signed by David Butcher of the state's Laboratory and Radiation Services Division, the letter said, "the analysis of socioeconomic impacts is also insufficient," and lacked "up-to-date and detailed recreation impact information, in particular for residents, rafters and tourists."

Asked about the blunt language, health department spokeswoman Marion Galant said, "it's not supposed to be a subtle message. They know they can re-submit it and they probably will."

"The Maywood thing really galvanized it, but mainly this city has been lied to by Cotter," Cunningham said. "Information here has been kept from the community. The newspaper here didn't cover the trials, didn't tell people what was going on."

Cañon City Mayor Ben Johnson said: "The City Council has said that we don't want to be known as a waste dump. Our town is so divided about this, but the best thing that the health department can do is get all of the information they can on it. The main thing we're interested in is that as the watchdog agency they do their job."

Cunningham said she expects the fight to continue, but was ready to count the latest chapter as an important victory.

"When you work at something so long you can hardly believe it," she said. "I suspect we're going to have a party."

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